Habinteg Housing Association Limited (202124509)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202124509

Habinteg Housing Association Limited

30 March 2023

 

Our approach

The Housing Ombudsman’s approach to investigating and determining complaints is to decide what is fair in all the circumstances of the case. This is set out in the Housing Act 1996 and the Housing Ombudsman Scheme (the Scheme). The Ombudsman considers the evidence and looks to see if there has been any ‘maladministration,’ for example whether the landlord has failed to keep to the law, followed proper procedure, followed good practice or behaved in a reasonable and competent manner.

Both the resident and the landlord have submitted information to the Ombudsman and this has been carefully considered. Their accounts of what has happened are summarised below. This report is not an exhaustive description of all the events that have occurred in relation to this case, but an outline of the key issues as a background to the investigation’s findings.

The complaint

  1. The complaint is about:
    1. The landlord’s handling of the resident’s reports of blocked drains outside her property.
    2. The landlord’s complaints handling.

Background

  1. The resident occupies the property, which is a 3-bedroom house, under a secure tenancy agreement with the landlord.
  2. The resident reported to the landlord that the drains outside her property were blocked, causing an offensive smell. The landlord attended to inspect and identified that a vacuum tanker lorry would be required to clear the blockage. This work was completed but the issue persisted. The landlord instructed a contractor to conduct a CCTV survey of the drains, which identified a build-up of scale and further works were recommended.
  3. The resident raised a formal complaint about the landlord’s failure to resolve the issue with the drains within a reasonable time. In response, the landlord initially indicated that it had taken appropriate action within the timeframes set out in its repairs policy, but it later acknowledged that there had been miscommunication around its processes for resolving drainage issues and the complaint was upheld. The resident was offered £50 compensation and £35 to reimburse her for the cost of printing.
  4. Following the landlord’s final complaint response, the resident continued to report blocked drains and unpleasant smells outside her property. The landlord conducted a further survey and identified that the area of concern was the responsibility of the water company. The landlord liaised with the water company, who attended on several occasions before the issue was finally resolved.
  5. The landlord contacted the resident to discuss her ongoing dissatisfaction with its service and increased its offer of compensation to £150. The resident considers that the offer of compensation should also take into account the amount she spent on products to deal with the offensive smells, which she estimates to be in the region of £600.

Assessment and findings

Response to report of blocked drains

  1. The landlord’s Tenants Handbook confirms that it is responsible for repairing and maintaining the structure and outside of the resident’s property, including the drains, gutters and outside pipes. It is also responsible for repairs and maintenance to the common areas.
  2. The landlord’s Repairs Policy states that routine repairs will be completed within 20 working days. Some issues may first require an inspection or survey, which will be completed within 7 days.
  3. The resident states that she first reported issues with the drains outside her property in an email sent to her landlord on 9 June 2020. A copy of the email has not been provided to this investigation. According to the landlord, the issue was first reported in April 2021 but again no evidence has been provided of the resident’s initial report. In the absence of documentary evidence, the Ombudsman cannot make findings about when the issue was first reported and so cannot fully investigate the extent of any delay.
  4. According to the landlord’s stage 2 complaint response, it first attended to inspect the drainage outside the resident’s property on 12 April 2021. It states that at that time the matter was referred to the water company to investigate. The landlord has not provided any record of the visit on 12 April 2021, or the referral to the water company, which raises concerns about its record keeping.
  5. On 21 April 2021 the resident reported that the issue was not resolved, and the landlord raised a job to clear the gullies outside her property. Although the landlord and the resident have indicated that these works were completed, there is no record of this in the landlord’s repairs log, or any evidence that further works were raised at that time.
  6. The evidence suggests that the landlord missed an opportunity to identify and raise the necessary works at an earlier stage. When the resident called to chase the works on 5 May 2021, the landlord could not see that an order had been raised on the system, and so a tanker was not ordered until 6 May 2021, which was after the landlord’s 20 working day timeframe for resolving a routine repair.
  7. The landlord recognised in its final complaint response of 29 July 2021 that there was miscommunication with the resident about its processes for resolving drainage issues. However, it did not identify that there were unnecessary delays in completing the works.
  8. Overall, prior to the final complaint response, the landlord did make reasonable efforts to resolve the drainage issues. The works completed by the landlord included jetting the drains outside the property, arranging for a vacuum tanker to jet the entire drainage system, commissioning an independent survey and carrying out the recommended de-scaling works.
  9. The Ombudsman acknowledges that it can sometimes be difficult to identify the extent of an issue and it is often reasonable to attempt to resolve the problem using conservative methods before arranging for more extensive works. The landlord has reflected that this could have been better communicated to the resident, evidencing that it has learnt from the complaint. The landlord increased its initial offer of compensation to £150 in an attempt to resolve the complaint to the resident’s satisfaction.
  10. The Ombudsman considers that the final amount of compensation offered by the landlord provides adequate redress to the resident for the failings it identified during the complaints process, and for the additional failings identified in this report, including its poor record keeping and the unreasonable delay in identifying the issue prior to 29 July 2021.
  11. The resident has requested additional compensation to reimburse her for the cost of items she states she bought to address the foul smell caused by the blocked drains, including bleach and fragrance products. The resident has not provided any evidence of the expenses that she states she incurred, and as such, it would not be reasonable or proportionate to expect the landlord to compensate the resident for such items.

Complaints handling

  1. The Ombudsman will only usually investigate and make findings about the landlord’s actions up until the date of the final complaint response. At the time of the resident’s complaint, the landlord operated a 3-stage complaints process, and it provided its final response on 29 July 2021, following a panel hearing where the drainage complaint was upheld. The landlord followed its complaints policy when responding to the initial complaint and so the Ombudsman makes a finding that there was no service failure in respect of its complaints handling.
  2. Separately though, the resident contacted the landlord on 18 August 2021 to report that the issue was not resolved and to ask it to raise a new complaint. Given that the complaint had already been addressed by the landlord and exhausted its process, it was not inappropriate that it took no steps to re-address this matter as a new complaint.
  3. In this circumstance, however, it would have been reasonable for the landlord to have better managed the resident’s expectations. The Ombudsman is aware that the resident continued to express her dissatisfaction with the landlord’s handling of the drainage issues up until January 2022 when the issues were finally resolved.
  4. This Service is aware that on completion of the works, the landlord increased its compensation offer. It is unclear whether this recognised that it also could have managed the resident’s communication better and re-directed her to this Service to pursue her outstanding dissatisfaction. In any case, the Ombudsman encourages landlords to ensure that where a resident continues to complain about its handling of a matter that has already been the subject of a formal complaint, it directs the resident to this Service.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53(b) of the Scheme, the landlord has made an offer of redress to the resident, which the Ombudsman considers satisfactorily resolves the complaint about its handling of the drainage issues.
  2. In accordance with paragraph 52 of the Scheme, there was no maladministration in respect of the landlord’s complaints handling.

Recommendation

  1. It is recommended that the landlord re-offer the resident £150 compensation if this has not already been paid.